A wide variety of security access control devices exist today which attempt to control access to secure areas. Security checkpoints at airports include metal detection and various forms of x-ray and scanning capability. However, if a person carrying a weapon was determined to pass through such a security checkpoint while knowing they would be instantly detected, they could do so, and until they were apprehended they could use their weapon within the airport. Metal detectors at the entrance to banks will warn if someone carries a gun into a bank, however it will not stop them from doing so.
Many security systems combine identification mechanisms such as cards, fingerprints, RFID, or optical scan of retina or facial features in order to identify an individual and allow them access. Unfortunately, the perpetrator of the crime is sometimes one normally allowed access to a facility or area, and use of an identification card will not hinder them. In the case of gathering places such as lecture halls at universities, schools in general, sporting events, airports, secure office buildings, and large business facilities, if a person with suicidal and/or murderous tendencies is determined to wreak havoc and destruction upon a large number of people, today's security access devices will not prevent them from entering if they are carrying a weapon and intend to use it.
Therefore, new security access control devices are needed that will not only detect a person carrying a weapon and attempting to pass through a security access point or portal, but will absolutely prevent that person and their baggage from passing if a decision is made to prevent them—that decision preferably being made automatically. When it is impractical to scan a person's baggage as they carry it with them through a human security portal, that baggage may be scanned separately. If an access control point utilizes robotic human portals that may operate unattended, it is therefore useful to have robotic baggage portals that operate unattended. To maximize security, when an automatic human portal detects that a person is a threat, that person's baggage should also be prevented from passing. Likewise, when a robotic or automatic baggage portal detects that an article of baggage represents a threat and prevents that article from passing, the person who placed that baggage into the baggage portal should also be prevented from passing.